


More Than Thou Hast Wit to Ask

by BlackEyedGirl



Category: Doctor Faustus - Christopher Marlowe
Genre: Consent Issues, M/M, Submission
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-10-24
Updated: 2012-10-24
Packaged: 2017-11-16 23:56:04
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,260
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/545233
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlackEyedGirl/pseuds/BlackEyedGirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Faustus has abandoned the notion of asking for a wife, after travelling so long with Mephistopheles as his companion. He asks for something else instead.</p>
            </blockquote>





	More Than Thou Hast Wit to Ask

**Author's Note:**

> The Globe's 2011 production was screened in my cinema today, so this happened.
> 
> **Content notes** : I think everything dark and twisty in this comes from either the play itself or the particular production, but it _is_ dark and twisty: Mephistopheles is enslaved to Faustus, Faustus is damned through this bond; Mephistopheles wants Faustus, and does not want him to have a wife. And it's a tragedy. Consent problems, stories which can only end unhappily.

Faustus asks, “You are my servant, Mephistopheles?”

He is Lucifer’s servant, traded in pledge for a mortal soul. But yes, Mephistopheles answers to Faustus’s pleasure. “What do you will?”

Faustus is smiling, spent with the pleasure of an evening consumed by performing marvels. A nod, a whisper, is enough to send Mephistopheles to his will. The people know the magician has a familiar spirit. The charms and songs are his own - the guests gasp and clap. In his rooms, Faustus sits; he looks at Mephistopheles. “I could ask you again for a wife.”

“Is that what you truly desire?” Faustus answers poorly to refusal but he can be moved, redirected. They have spent time enough in each other’s company to know each other better now.

“There were maids, at dinner, lovely enough to spend my pleasure with.”

Faustus spends his pleasure freely; Mephistopheles has been witness many times. Faustus had never asked him to leave. When Mephistopheles brings forth a woman, flesh or spirit, he makes himself unseen to her. He is always visible to Faustus: that is the bargain drawn. Mephistopheles is present always and invisible to all but Faustus; to Faustus he takes the shape Faustus desires. But his Faustus has never asked for another shape but this one. Mephistopheles appears like another scholar, a disciple come to be here in the presence of the great conjuror. Mephistopheles stands before him this night and asks, “Which maid was it that so delighted Faustus? Which flushed cheek and soft hand?”

Faustus takes hold of Mephistopheles’s wrist, smoothing his own yet ink-stained thumb over the palm. “No maid, then, this night.”

“I can show you more wondrous pleasures than they.”

“And so you always say,” Faustus observes, “whenever we begin to talk of wives.”

“We talked of maids, not wives.”

Faustus asks again, “You are my servant, Mephistopheles?”

“I am at your command.”

Faustus toys again with his hand, idly as though it were a lute and Mephistopheles had strings to pluck. “And you would take a servile attitude?”

Faustus has not so delighted in winning Mephistopheles’s obedience since he was first called forth. Mephistopheles folds down onto his knees; his hand pulls free. “A penitent, my master?”

“No. No, not that. Let us have no talk of penitence. Only regard for our purposes. You have not refused me yet, save that which Lucifer, who is master of us both, has circumscribed. And I cannot think he would object to this. It is in his nature, is it not, to encourage corruption?”

“You forget,” Mephistopheles says, “Lucifer has interest in those souls held in balance.” He lowers his head. “There is no _part_ of you left to corrupt.” He illustrates his point with a kiss to the tip of Faustus’s – still booted – toe. Then the wool-clad knee. Thigh. He presses his knuckles to the man’s abdomen, above where the fabric starts to strain. Faustus groans but does not ask him to shift lower. There are buttons, still, all in a row. Mephistopheles undoes three, makes a gap to place this next kiss on mortal skin – a pale, soft belly. Faustus makes no move to aid in the unfastening of clothing; he sits passive while Mephistopheles touches the last kiss to his breastbone. “What do you will?”

Faustus lays a hand on him once more, tugging Mephistopheles’s hair. He is gentle, sometimes. He is perhaps not so wholly corrupt as either of them would paint him. He did not choose a maid tonight. When he touches Mephistopheles like this, there is an apology in it, although there are no words with which to express that sentiment. That will be gone soon. Love is all in heaven, although there are lovers plenty damned to hell. Faustus says, “Undress me.”

Mephistopheles unbuckles the shoes, and slides them from Faustus’s feet. He removes doublet, hose, cap, until Faustus is before him in just the half-done white shirt. His prick is mostly soft yet, when Mephistopheles takes it in his mouth. He is warm, salt-tasting, sweat; his hips jerk like an animal. His pleasure cries cut off, fearful of calling on one lord or angering the other. His fingers hurt when they pull, but the pain is muddled with Faustus calling on Mephistopheles. They respond to their own names, always. Mephistopheles can never choose whether to regret Faustus calling on him, but he will never wish another name was called instead.

If this be hell, Faustus said once. It is all hell, where Mephistopheles exists, where heaven is not. But this is a hell of a different type. Its torments are different, sharper and more sweet. Four and twenty years are nothing, to one who has spent so long in hell. It is a candle-flame, extinguished with a breath. But even a candle-flame is something in the dark. Faustus is damned but his soul is not taken yet. It burns, a promise not yet won. Mephistopheles would not be away from him. His salt. His cruelty and impiety, his foolish longing to learn everything under the heavens and nothing within them. His resigned smiling when he thinks them partners in this damnation. 

They are not. Faustus will be dragged to hell and he will look to Mephistopheles to save him. Mephistopheles could not save himself, dragged along in Lucifer’s wake; his form - human or spirit - is no shield against his lord. And now that the deed is already done, Mephistopheles would not take up a sword to change the course of the battle even if he could. The humans are deceived in their ideas of heaven and hell. There is justice in hell, and there is law, it is only mercy which is lacking. A repentant soul cannot be taken. A soul cannot be tricked into a devil’s bargain. Mephistopheles told Faustus what would happen, and he spoke of the pain. Faustus gave his soul willingly, a gift made over like a contract of marriage. 

Faustus gasps and it sounds like a death rattle. It would not matter if it was; if he died this night he would be restored, a very little death indeed. But he breathes now, returning to himself.

Mephistopheles does not choke. He does not breathe. Faustus kisses the top of his head, where Mephistopheles has pressed it to his stomach. “I think, after all, you knew my desires before I spoke of them.”

“Yes.”

Faustus leans back in the chair, hands still moving in Mephistopheles’s hair. His look betrays his attitude: a question will come soon. “What do you desire, Mephistopheles? Or do devils have no use for want?”

This is a question to which Faustus already has an answer, if he remembered it. They all want. They hunger but are not satisfied. They wish companions in their misery. Mephistopheles wants something he may never have again. Faustus will understand that soon. They are twenty years through four and twenty. Mephistopheles tears his gaze from Faustus. 

Faustus smiles. “Ask and ask and always you evade the answers.”

“You will have answers. Tonight, though, I promised you more wonders.” 

Faustus stands, and offers out his hand to Mephistopheles. “Take it.” They are taken and taking both already. Mephistopheles grips his hand, and is not surprised to find himself drawn up, nor that his shoulder is caught up under Faustus’s arm. They exit arm over arm, as close as this flesh will allow. The candlelight gutters, and the chasm beckons. Faustus’s eyes are over-bright, his fingers making claws in Mephistopheles’s borrowed skin. This is hell too, and Mephistopheles holds him still tighter.


End file.
